AQUATAP-ES Stakeholders event

Ronald de Bruin
Director of the COST Association

Dr Ronald de Bruin was appointed Director of the COST Association on 1 June 2016. Before joining the Association, Ronald was Director of the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT) and Head of Department of the European Network and Information Security Agency (ENISA). For almost eight years, he played a key role in and managing and setting up these European Union agencies from scratch.

Prior to this, he was Deputy Director of a public-private partnership platform for the Information Society in the Netherlands for over three years. His main responsibilities included drafting the annual work programs including public-private partnership projects, managing the implementation of national multi-stakeholder projects, and coordinating EU-funded projects.

For almost three years, he worked for a global COM company with top-100 clients. During his one-year stay as manager at KPMG, he worked on developing e-security services for the growing e-commerce market. He started his career as Policy Advisor for the Dutch national government, where, for three years, he was responsible for developing a national policy on e-security services, and scenarios for introducing digital TV.

He is Ambassador to Brussels for the Greenleaf Center for Servant Leadership Europe and Founding Director of the Greenleaf Center in Brussels.

Dr De Bruin has also authored several books on servant-leadership, digital television, online consumer trust and computer security. He holds a Ph.D.in Law and Computer Science, an M.Sc. in Technology Management and a B.Sc. in Electronic Engineering.

Panagiotis Balabanis
Head of Sector water, DG RTD

Since 1990, Panagiotis Balabanis is working at the European Commission, DG Research and Innovation and he is actually Head of the sector Water in the Circular Economy and Biobased Systems Unit. In this context, he is dealing with issues related to water, resource efficiency and circular economy, with a view of supporting the transition to a healthy planet, which is climate neutral by 2050, and operating within safe planetary boundaries. During those years, Panagiotis Balabanis has been involved in the definition and implementation of successive research programmes in the field of water, environment and sustainable development. Panagiotis Balabanis holds a Diploma from the Agricultural University of Athens, Greece, a Master Degree (D.E.A - Diplome de d’Etudes Approfondies) and a Doctorate in "Mechanic of mass and energy exchanges", from the University J.Fourrier, Grenoble I, France. Before joining the European Commission he worked as research associate at the Agricultural University of Athens.

Mostafa Panahi
Environmental and Energy Economics Expert IPBES

Mostafa Panahi currently works at the Graduate School of the Natural Resources and Environment, Science and Research Branch of Azad University in Tehran/Iran. He is the Dean of Faculty of the Environment and Head of Energy Engineering and Economics Department. Mostafa does research in Environmental and Energy Economics. His current projects are "Lead Author for Chapter 3 of the Global Assessment of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services of IPBES"; "Economic Analysis of Low Carbon Economy Strategies in Power Generation Sector"; "Economic Assessment of Environmental Damages".

Mary Kelly Quinn

AQUATAP-ES Scientific Coordinator

Dr Mary Kelly-Quinn is an associate professor in the School of Biology and Environmental Science, University College Dublin.

Her research focuses on assessment of land-use and other anthropogenic activities on the physical, hydrochemical and ecological quality of surface waters with particular reference to multiple stressors and climate change.

Among her current projects are SSNet (on small streams), SWAMP (on water quality in degraded peatlands), ESDecide (freshwater ecosystem services decision support) and recently completed RECONNECT (mapping and assessing barrier impacts on rivers). She is also collaborating on a project on natural capital accounting in Ireland and further afield with the University of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia and in Kenya with the University of Pwani on water quality issues.

Nihat Zal

Water Resources, Water Scarcity and Droughts Expert, EEA

Dr. Nihat Zal, having background in Physical Geography and Landscape Architecture, has been working as Project Manager at the European Environment Agency since 2011. He mainly deals with water resources, water scarcity and resource efficiency related issues in the area of water. He has been involved in various projects and activities not only in European region but also in West Balkans, Caucasus and Central Asia. He is author of numerous papers and reports. Since 2014, he has been working on the development of the European water accounts. Recently, the European Environment Agency has published the first geo-referenced water accounts for physical asset accounts and flow accounts at the river basin level.